WWF - Arctic publications

The Circle 01.13

2013-05-07

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The Arctic Council Ministerial meeting in Kiruna, Sweden, in May 2013 completes the first full rotation of circumpolar countries chairing the Council since its creation in 1996. Much has changed in the far north since then. This next cycle will be a time to look at how the Arctic Council functions as a regional process, the new challenges and new realities the Arctic faces.

This edition of The Circle explores some of these issues. Authors delve into the readiness of Arctic nations to use the Council to provide environmental stewardship; they reflect the huge responsibility circumpolar countries are feeling towards the people locally and globally who will be affected by the council's successes or failures while others scrutinize the political will and commitment to balancing sustainable development with protecting and preserving this unique place on the globe.

What WWF is doing for polar bears

2013-02-12

WWF has been a conservation presence in the Arctic for nearly 40 years and has created a strong voice for the conservation of biodiversity, protected areas, wildlife and and the well-being of local and Indigenous peoples. WWF is actively engaged in ongoing work in all of the Arctic countries, with offices in every country where polar bears are found, including in Arctic communities. WWF has permanent observer status in the Arctic Council, a coordinating body for work on the environment and sustainable development involving Arctic states and Indigenous peoples.

The Circle 04.12

2012-12-19

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This edition of The Circle is dedicated to the Arctic's ice whales: the bowhead, the largest whale in polar waters and the longest-lived mammal species on Earth; the narwhal, whose long tusk has mystified humans for years; and the beautiful white beluga, a sentinel of the Arctic Ocean's health.

In September 2012, it became clear that the arctic sea ice extent was a record low this year. In this issue, we are looking at the dramatic changes that are currently taking place, and the impact that these developments may have on arctic cetaceans.

As extractive industries are increasing activities in the Arctic, the observed summer-time melting of arctic sea ice has already far exceeded the worst-case projections from climate models of the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The time to implement effective climate change adaptation measures is now. We need to strengthen the linkages between policy makers, scientists, local communities, and industry, to be able to mitigate the quickly increasing threats faced by arctic cetaceans and the people that depend on them.

Polar Bear factsheet

2012-12-12

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The Circle 03.12

2012-09-21

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The history of protected areas in the Arctic goes back more than a century, to the establishment of Afognak Island State Park in Alaska. Historically, such parks were considered to be places that would protect natural values, from species to landscapes. However, there are pressures in the Arctic that mean future conservation models must expand from the existing, relatively static park system towards more dynamic and comprehensive concepts.

In this issue of the Circle, we explore existing models for a new, expanded conservation approach and consider how they could be applied in the North -- whether by adapting a successful model from somewhere else in the globe, or growing a local approach in the Arctic.

Whatever the conservation methods chosen, it is clear that the Arctic is changing fast, and that policy makers and conservation managers must also move quickly in order to be effective at conserving the locally and globally valued – not to mention valuable - species, landscapes, and ecosystems in the region.

The Circle 02.12

2012-06-18

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Arctic peoples have depended on fish for their survival for centuries. Fisheries today provide vital income for many coastal communities in the region, and maintain an important role in subsistence. Arctic fisheries are also important for food security beyond the Arctic, as several of the world's largest fisheries are found there, feeding consumers around the world.

At the same time as these fish stocks are growing in global importance, they are facing global threats. Overfishing has started to threaten some species, climate change is increasing sea temperatures, and the carbon dioxide driving climate change is also increasing ocean acidification. At the same time, the petroleum industry is showing a growing interest in the Arctic region, contributing to tension and strengthening the concern that co-existence of these two industries is impossible.

In this issue of The Circle, we look at the challenges faced by arctic fish stocks, and discuss solutions that can ensure a full and healthy arctic fish basket for future generations.

WWF in the Arctic: Celebrating 20 years

2012-04-24

2012 is a special year for WWF's Global Arctic Programme. 20 years ago, some visionary people created this circumpolar programme to champion conservation around the Arctic.

Download our special 20th anniversary booklet to learn about the highlights of our work from the past 2 decades, and our current and future projects in this rapidly changing region.

RACER (Rapid Assessment of Circumarctic Ecosystem Resilience)

2012-04-24

Download the RACER handbook

The 'RACER' (Rapid Assessment of Circumarctic Ecosystem Resilience) project is a tool to help governments and communities around the Arctic safeguard the functioning ecosystems people depend on from the environmental disruption caused by climate change.

The handbook outlines RACER's two-step approach:

Identify and map features that are likely to help ecosystems cope with change. Those features and areas are marked by two indicators, diversity (different kinds of life) and productivity (abundance of life).
Assess forecasted climate impacts for those places and their likely ability to function in future Arctic climate change conditions until the year 2100.

RACER is necessary because sweeping climate-driven change is coming to the Arctic. The region is affected by global climate change more than most other places on the planet. Over the last 50 years the Arctic has warmed at almost twice the rate of the global average. Arctic places and species are already affected by the change in climate which is quickly becoming the dominant threat to the viability of arctic ecosystems.

The Circle 01.12

2012-03-14

Managing arctic natural resources in times of rapid change

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Rapid change is the new constant in the Arctic, yet our approaches to managing arctic land, seas and natural resources have not kept pace.

This is all the more surprising as the world looks to the Arctic to learn how we can address change -- and safeguard the functioning of ecosystems, granting us the goods and services we all depend upon. In many parts of the transforming Arctic, traditional ways of managing places and resources will become increasingly ineffective.

Resilience-based thinking offers a path out of current dilemmas but there have been few real-world applications in the Arctic. As a result, we often lack concrete examples of resilience in practice, and its benefits.

This issue of The Circle seeks to identify ways forward by looking at resilience-related approaches and tools for arctic natural resource management. While Ellen Inga Turi and Svein D. Mathiesen point out that much could be learnt from traditional reindeer-herding, Gary Kofinas looks at resilience with an ecosystem service lens, and Raul Primicerio and Michaela Aschan outline the possibilities and challenges from an ecosystem-based management perspective.

Highlighting the very timely nature of this topic, we also present the recently initiated Arctic Resilience Report, and WWF's new RACER project. Finally, Donald McLennan looks at how these tools and ideas could be applied in the concrete case of Canadian national parks, and Ambassador Andreas von Uexkull points out the role the Arctic Council could play in the future to link theory and practice in this area.

Fossil Fuels – At What Cost?

2012-03-12

Ivetta Gerasimchuk. Fossil Fuels – At What Cost? Government support for upstream oil and gas activities in Russia. – Moscow – Geneva; WWF-Russia, Global Subsidies Initiative of the International Institute for Sustainable Development. 2012

The report Fossil Fuels – At What Cost? Government support to upstream oil and gas activities in Russia is aimed at assisting Russia in meeting its Group of Twenty (G-20) and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) commitment to "rationalize and phase-out over the medium term inefficient fossil fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption." The first steps in this direction are identification of budget outlays, tax breaks, and other forms of fiscal support for oil and gas extraction and measuring their economic and social efficiency, including integrated costs to the environment and future generations.

WWF-Russia has initiated this first comprehensive inventory of fossil-fuel subsidies in Russia in order to increase transparency of the economic mechanisms that contribute to the growth of greenhouse gas emissions and destruction of natural habitats, especially in the Arctic. In this sense, WWF-Russia follows the same logic that underpins G-20 and APEC commitments to fossil-fuel subsidy reform, but does it from a civil society prospective, advocating a broad debate about the efficiency of any governmental measures that affect the environment and socioeconomic welfare of the people, including over the long term.

WWF-Russia's goal is for the world to develop an equitable and resilient low-carbon economy by 2050. In accordance with international agreements under the auspices of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, G-8, G-20 and other international forums, all efforts should be undertaken to keep the global average temperature from increasing by more than 2.0°C (compared to 1850). Fossil fuels are the main source of greenhouse gas emissions driving climate change and posing a threat to many natural habitats and human livelihoods.

In the Arctic, which is highly vulnerable to climate change, WWF-Russia works to preserve the region's rich biodiversity and to ensure that the use of its natural resources is sustainable. Of late, the Arctic has become the frontier region where Russian oil and gas companies are increasingly expanding their activities.

Meanwhile, WWF-Russia identifies three important gaps that have yet to be closed in order to enable safe development of the Arctic riches: a governance gap, a knowledge and science gap, and a gap in the technical capacity for oil spill response. In view of these gaps, the tax relief schemes discussed in this report incentivize oil and gas companies to carry out projects with extremely high environmental risks offshore and in new areas beyond the polar circle instead of building up "smart" investments into improvements in energy efficiency and oil recovery at existing onshore fields.

Based on the methodology of the Global Subsidies Initiative, this report also explains the cost of Russia's continued reliance on extraction of oil and gas. In our opinion, the "business-as-usual" approach to the development of the Russian energy sector may no longer be adequate for the current global challenges and Russia's modernization agenda.

We look forward to a broad discussion of both the report's findings and future research on its subject matter. We also hope that this report will make a useful contribution to the international body of research underpinning the global reform of wasteful and inefficient subsidies and the wider agenda-sustainable and effective energy in the 21st century.

Space technology for marine mammal research and conservation in the Arctic

2012-02-22

With the support of WWF-Russia and Council on Marine Mammals Research and development center, ScanEx carried out a project to perfect decoding of satellite images of walrus locations in the south-east Barents region.

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The quality of the acquired images allowed us to define the locations and approximate number of walrus groups.

Lack of knowledge of the Atlantic walrus is a serious obstacle to reducing the negative impact on these animals from developing oil and gas extraction.

This brochure is intended for specialists, teachers and university students.

2011 Arctic Field Program News (US)

2012-02-06

The WWF-US Arctic Field Program, based in Alaska, has released its 2011 annual review. In this issue, learn about the program's work with communities in Alaska and Russia to conserve the region's ecological and cultural values.

Highlights include:

Community-based salmon management in Alaska and Russia - a win-win situation for salmon and people
Illegal oil exploration in Russia's key fishery
Lessons not learned: Offshore development in Arctic Seas
Science knows no boundaries: International research builds bridges across the Bering Strait

Download the newsletter here.

The WWF-US Arctic Field Program promotes science and stewardship of the Bering, Beaufort, Chukchi and Okhotsk Seas.

The Circle 03.11

2012-01-12

WWF's Arctic History:

20 years of the Global Arctic Programme

This is a special year for WWF's Global Arctic Programme, as it marks 20 years since some visionary people decided to create a WWF body to champion conservation in the Arctic.

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When the programme was founded in 1992, there was very limited understanding of the Arctic and its importance. Today, understanding of the Arctic is improved if still limited, but its importance is recognized as a variety of interested parties race to take advantage of its natural resources and shipping opportunities.

The reason for the renewed interest? Arctic temperatures are warming more than twice as fast as they are for the planet as a whole. Sea ice is melting. Northern shipping routes and oil deposits are reliably accessible for the first time.

But as the region warms and development increases, Arctic wildlife and peoples are beginning to live altered lives.

In this issue of the Circle, we celebrate the history of the Global Arctic Programme, and its ongoing mission to ensure a resilient, sustainable future for the Arctic.

Book review: The World in 2050 – Four Forces Shaping Civilization's Northern Future

2011-03-22

The World in 2050 – Four Forces Shaping Civilization's Northern Future
Laurence C. Smith
336 pages
Dutton Books

Review by Clive Tesar

This is an interesting book about the circumpolar world mostly because it is not solely a book about the circumpolar world. Smith, a geography professor from the University of California in Los Angeles, devotes the first portion of his book to global pressures and global consequences.

Demographic trends, climate change, natural resource demand, and globalisation are traced across the world, with their projected impacts to the year 2050. The picture that emerges is disturbing for much of the world – parched, overcrowded, chaotic and scorched.

When he gets to the Arctic, the picture ameliorates. An already water-rich area gains even more water (except in Canada's south-central prairies and the Russian steppes). Crushingly cold winters ease off; it's not always shirt-sleeve weather, but the successive weeks of minus 40 become a thing of the past. In addition, the north holds a pool of untapped oil and gas for which the rest of the world is increasingly thirsting.

Even the traditional lives of Indigenous peoples, who are seeing ice highways disappear and have to feed their reindeer herds because of changing forage conditions, are not all gloomy. Smith says when he went looking for climate impacts on coastal marine mammal hunters (mostly Inuit) what he found instead was that, "They are not sitting about idly in despair or gazing forlornly out at the unfamiliar sea. They are buying boats, and organising workshops, and setting about catching the fat salmon that are increasingly moving into their seas."

While envisioning a relatively comfortable future for the peoples of the north, Smith predicts a more negative future for northern nature. Those 'fat salmon' he mentions are likely displacing existing northern species, or have moved in because other species have already moved to surroundings that better suit them – assuming any of those surroundings remain. There will be many losers in the natural world, especially those closely associated with sea ice. Having said that, the overall abundance of wildlife in the north may increase, as Smith says: "The ecology of the North is imperilled and changing. But it will be anything but lifeless."

Smith does not reveal much about his feelings about the transformations he sees in the Arctic until nearly the end of the book where he says, "Many of the transformations I've presented in this book are negative, and those that are positive extract a toll someplace else." In other words, northerners should not feel smug about their privileged place should the changes envisioned by Smith come to pass. Rather, they should reflect on whether their relative good fortune should come at the price of human misery elsewhere in the world, and the loss and transformation of their own natural world.

As Smith concludes, "No doubt we humans will survive anything, even if polar bears and Arctic cod do not ...To me, the more important question is not of capacity but of desire: What kind of world do we want?"

Proceedings of the 15th Meeting of the Polar Bear Specialist Group

2011-02-09

The 15th meeting of the PBSG was convened in Copenhagen in June/July 2009, and the proceedings from the meeting are now available.

The proceedings contain minutes, press release, resolutions, the subpopulation status table and country reports on management and research on polar bears in the period since the previous meeting.

Background

Following the First International Scientific Meeting on the Polar Bear which was held in Fairbanks, Alaska in 1965, the Polar Bear Specialist Group was formed to coordinate research and management of polar bears.

Eight years following the First Scientific Meeting, the 'Agreement on the Conservation of Polar Bears and Their Habitat' was signed by the Governments of Canada, Denmark, Norway, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and the United States.

Article VII of the Agreement states: "The Contracting Parties shall conduct national research programmes on polar bears, particularly research relating to the conservation and management of the species. They shall as appropriate coordinate such research with research carried out by other Parties, consult with other Parties on the management of migrating polar bear populations, and exchange information on research and management programmes, research results and data on bears taken."

As part of their commitment to fulfil the intent of the Agreement, representatives of all five signatory nations, together with invited specialists, attended the 15th Working Meeting of the IUCN/SSC Polar Bear Specialist Group that was held 29 June–3 July 2009 in Copenhagen, Denmark and hosted by the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources.

The proceedings of this meeting are available for download in pdf form on the right of this page.

A comparison of longline and trawl fishing practices and suggestions for encouraging the sustainable management of fisheries in the Barents Sea

2011-02-07

This study presents a comparison of Russian trawling and long-line bottom fishing practices. Biological, ecological and social-economic aspects are considered. Prospects of development of trawling and longline fishing in the Barents sea are analysed and recommendations about rational use of marine living resources of the Barents sea are made.

New Arctic needs new rules: WWF

2010-04-26

Copenhagen, Denmark - A new, warmer Arctic cannot continue to operate under rules that assume it is ice-covered and essentially closed to fishing, resource exploration and development and shipping, WWF said today as it launched a group of reports on protecting a newly accessible, highly vulnerable environment with profound significance for global climate, the global economy and global security.

The International Governance and Regulation of the Marine Arctic reports (all three are accessible by downloading a single pdf document: see download link, International Governance and Regulation of the Marine Arctic, right or bottom) were launched as Russian president Medvedev visits Norwegian capital Oslo for talks which include arctic issues and just before the Arctic Council meets in Greenland.

"The melting of the arctic ice is opening a new ocean, bringing new possibilities for commercial activities in a part of the world that has previously been inaccessible," said Lasse Gustavsson, incoming Executive Conservation Director for WWF-International and currently CEO of WWF-Sweden.

"What happens in the Arctic has a global environmental and economic impact. For instance, more than a quarter of the fish eaten in Europe comes from the Arctic, and yet we do not have effective rules for fishing in newly accessible areas."

The Arctic may well be ice free in the summers within decades. Commercial ships have recently successfully sailed the Northern Sea Route above Siberia, and ship yards are getting more and more orders for tankers capable of dealing with remnant ice.

Accelerating oil and gas exploration is raising the prospects of Exxon Valdez scenarios - spills in highly susceptible environments in the absence of clean-up rules and infrastructure. A related issue is the impact on marine mammals and fish from noise generated by shipping and seismic activity to locate hydrocarbon deposits.

The first report (available by downloading the pdf, International Governance and Regulation of the Marine Arctic, right, or bottom) analyses how today's international legal regime meets the challenges posed by the unprecedented rapid change taking place in the Arctic. It concludes there are large gaps in governance and management regimes, with loopholes that could allow irreparable damage to the marine environment, its biodiversity and Indigenous peoples.

The responsibilities and mechanisms for keeping marine resource extraction within sustainable limits are unclear and so are the responsibilities and mechanisms for preventing or responding to pollution accidents and shipping disasters.

While the second report (available by downloading the pdf, International Governance and Regulation of the Marine Arctic, right, or bottom) outlines the options, the third report (also available by downloading the same pdf link) proposes a new arctic framework convention as a solution that could address the urgent gaps.

"We challenge arctic governments to advance alternatives that would work equally well to safeguard the region," said Gustavsson.

"WWF shows that it is not possible to simply deny that problems exist, or to insist that there are already adequate responses to the problems."

"We need a new comprehensive solution for the protection of the arctic marine environment. The ice has protected the Arctic Ocean for hundreds of years; we have collectively removed that protection though our contributions to climate change, and now we must work collectively to replace that protection."

NB: All three reports are available in the one pdf download: International Governance and Regulation of the Marine Arctic [pdf, 1.99 MB].

For further information:

Lasse Gustavsson, incoming Executive Conservation Director at WWF-International and currently CEO of WWF-Sweden, lasse.gustavsson@wwf.se, +46 70 105 30 55

Dr. Tatiana Saksina, Arctic Governance Officer, WWF International Arctic Programme, TSaksina@wwfint.org, + 41 79 535 28 26

Warming Arctic's global impacts outstrip predictions

2009-09-02

Warming in the Arctic could lead to flooding affecting one quarter of the world's population, substantial increases in greenhouse gas emissions from massive carbon pools, and extreme global weather changes, according to a new WWF report.

The Arctic Climate Feedbacks: Global Implications report, released today, outlines dire global consequences of a warming Arctic that are far worse than previous projections. The unprecedented peer-reviewed report brings together top climate scientists who have assessed the current science on arctic warming.

"What they found was a truly sobering picture,' said Dr Martin Sommerkorn, senior climate change advisor for WWF's Arctic programme. 'What this report says is that a warming Arctic is much more than a local problem, it's a global problem.

"Simply put, if we do not keep the Arctic cold enough, people across the world will suffer the effects."

The report shows that numerous arctic climate feedbacks – negative effects prompted by the impacts of warming -- will make global climate change more severe than indicated by other recent projections, including those of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's 2007 assessment.

The dramatic loss of sea ice resulting from the Arctic warming at about twice the rate of the rest of the world will influence atmospheric circulation and weather in the Arctic and beyond. This is projected to change temperature and precipitation patterns in Europe and North America, affecting agriculture, forestry and water supplies.

In addition, the Arctic's frozen soils and wetlands store twice as much carbon as is held in the atmosphere. As warming in the Arctic continues, soils will increasingly thaw and release carbon into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide and methane, at significantly increased rates. Levels of atmospheric methane, a particularly potent greenhouse gas, have been increasing for the past two years, and it is suggested that the increase comes from warming arctic tundra.

In a first-of-its kind assessment incorporating the fate of the ice sheets of Greenland and West Antarctica into global sea level projections, the WWF report concludes that sea- levels will very likely rise by more than one meter by 2100 -- more than twice the amount given in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's 2007 assessment that had excluded the contribution of ice sheets from their projection. The associated flooding of coastal regions will affect more than a quarter of the world's population.

"This report shows that it is urgently necessary to rein in greenhouse gas emissions while we still can," Sommerkorn said. "If we allow the Arctic to get too warm, it is doubtful whether we will be able to keep these feedbacks under control.

WWF has joined with other NGOs to produce a model climate treaty for Copenhagen that gives the world a blueprint for achieving the kind of emissions cuts needed to likely avoid arctic feedbacks.

"We need to listen now to these signals from the Arctic, and take the necessary action in Copenhagen this December to get a deal that quickly and effectively limits greenhouse gas emissions," said James Leape, director general of WWF International.

In December 2009, the governments of 191 countries will meet in Copenhagen, Denmark, for the final round of negotiations for a new global agreement on climate change. The first period of the current agreement, called the 'Kyoto Protocol', will end in three years, in December 2012. The negotiations in Copenhagen are supposed to approve a new legal framework for global climate action from 2013 onwards.

According to WWF, this framework must guarantee much deeper and more rapid emission cuts from industrialized countries, and financing to developing countries to enable them also to take climate action.

For more information, contact:

Dr Martin Sommerkorn - The Arctic Climate Feedbacks Report +47 926 06 995, msommerkorn@wwf.no

Kim Carstensen - Director, WWF Global Climate Initiative+45 40 34 36 35, k.carstensen@wwf.dk

Ian Morrison, Media Officer, WWF International (Switzerland): +41 79 874 6853, imorrison@wwfint.org

Clive Tesar, Head of Communications, WWF International Arctic Programme (Canada): (+1) 613 232 2535, ctesar@wwf.no

The Svalbard archipelago in the Barents Sea: An arctic paradise

2009-04-03

The remote Svalbard archipelago in the Barents Sea, which includes the island of Spitsbergen, is one of the most productive ecosystems in the world, and among the most biologically diverse in the Arctic.

Svalbard, and the seas and sea ice around it, is home to polar bears, seals, walrus, arctic fox, and Svalbard reindeer. Millions of seabirds breed here every summer, and the seas contain some of the largest fish stocks in the world as well as a number of whale species. Svalbard is also rich in historical sites from the early days of polar exploration, whaling and mining.

However, despite its remoteness, the islands are not immune to environmental threats. Climate change is the greatest long-term threat to the Arctic, and has already begun affecting natural ecosystems and traditional ways of life at an alarming rate. Air and water temperatures are increasing on Svalbard, glaciers are shrinking and there is less sea ice around the archipelago.

Oil and gas exploration is a new threat: some 25 percent of the world's unexploited oil and gas reserves lie in the Arctic, some in the waters around Svalbard. Depleted reserves elsewhere in the world, coupled with high oil prices mean oil companies now see the Arctic as ripe for exploitation. With development will come a growing risk to biodiversity from increases in shipping to the potential for oil spills. Illegal fishing is threatening the long-term survival of fish stocks, while damaging chemicals, used in everyday goods around the world, are now turning up in arctic wildlife, such as the polar bear.

Tourism too can threaten this fragile enviroment. Cruise tourism and day trips by ship have become increasingly popular, and unless their impact on the environment is limited, they will add to the existing stresses to these high arctic ecosystems.

For more information, please download the brochure (link top right).

2 poles + 2 degrees = 2 much!

2009-04-02

A new WWF publication highlights the two main mechanisms by which the poles drive the planetary climate system, and thus the reasons why changes in the polar regions have major consequences for every country in the world.

The signals coming from both poles are clear, observable and scientifically validated: man-made climate change is causing warming. This is a major concern for the peoples and ecosystems of the north, and for the unique Antarctic ecosystems.

Climate change has brought new species to places they have not been before, stressed existing species, and raised concerns about potential extinctions and sweeping changes to natural systems. But the polar effects are only the tip of the iceberg.

Change already being seen at the poles will unleash a cascade of predicted wrenching climate change effects that will envelope the entire planet, unless the governments of the world unite for swift and decisive action.

Download 2 poles + 2 degrees = 2 much! [pdf, 535 KB]